


but not enough to let me drown

by theformerone



Series: tumblr prompts [14]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Alternate Universe - Royalty, F/F, Tenten thinks Temari is pretty when she's drowning and now they're married
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-06-23
Packaged: 2019-05-27 03:36:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15015803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theformerone/pseuds/theformerone
Summary: Temari goes overboard when pirates attack the vessel she and her brother's are on board. A mermaid saves her life.for prompt "I can't swim! Someone save me!"





	but not enough to let me drown

Temari was born and raised in the desert. She’s been windsurfing since she could mount her own sail, alright? You drop her in the middle of No Man’s Land with her board and half a breeze and she could make it back to the cities before nightfall. She could. 

But she can’t swim. None of the desert kids can. There isn’t enough water to necessitate the skill; all the water they have is for drinking, and the elders are hardasses who don’t want feet in the water they need to survive. Rationing is strict, and being caught in the water when you aren’t supposed to is a punishable offense, even for a princess like Temari. 

It doesn’t help her now that she’s in the goddamn ocean of all places (she was going to kill her brothers if she didn’t die first, and if she died first, she was going to haunt the shit out of them), with salt water in her mouth, in her eyes, her tool belt and desert scarves a heavy weight the more they soak up the water around them. 

“I can’t swim!” she shouts, swallowing her pride and choking on water for it. “Someone - !”

On the ship above her, Kankurō staring down at her with more fear in his eyes than Temari has ever seen before. Gaara is still caught up in the fighting aboard, and she’s grateful. She doesn’t want her youngest brother to see her like this. 

Goddamn pirates. Goddamn fucking  _pirates_. Goddamn fucking Red Sand Sasori. Temari was going to kick his ass if she didn’t drown. Trust a former treasonous traitor to know that the first thing to do to someone from Suna in a fight was to throw them into the nearest body of water. 

Fuck that guy. If Temari made it out of this alive, she was going to drag him back to Suna and execute him himself. His bounty would make a nice addition to her already sizeable inheritance. 

She sees Kankurō search for something to throw to her, but she also sees an enemy come up from behind him. She wants to scream at him to watch his back, to stop worrying about her, to let a crewman save her life. The enemy’s strike goes down hard on the puppet on her brother’s back, and after that, he turns and fights. 

Temari is grateful. The desert gods look kindly on those who die in battle. Less kindly on those who die choking on their most precious resource. 

Fuck the ocean. Temari would like to file a complaint. 

She prays to Kamatari, though she knows the minor weasel god can’t do much to take care of her from here. She tries kicking out her legs and arms, but nothing seems to work. Her heavy desert clothes drag her down further, and further still, and then the surface is a memory, and Temari is frighteningly aware of the fact that the next breath she takes will be water and nothing else. 

She shuts her eyes, still clawing for the surface. Her hand brushes against something oddly soft, and she reaches for it, trying to kick herself in its direction. She grabs it, digs her fingernails in, refuses to let go. The thing grabs her back. 

It’s a hand. 

Temari’s eyes snap open. She isn’t as deep as she thought. There is sunlight under the water, and what she sees in front of her is so strange she can’t believe it. 

There are all sorts of strange and terrible things to be found in the desert. Scorpions the size of a full grown man. Wandering tanuki that can possess you if you don’t get enough sleep at night. Snakes whose venom can kill you the second they bite you. Wisps of smoke and light that can grant your wishes. 

This thing is even more wonderful. 

It’s a woman. The body of a woman, or the chest at least, whose hips end in the red and white striped tail of a lionfish. Her human torso is marked with scars, her breasts bare, her brown hair in two buns. Around her hips is a strange belt almost like Temari’s, bogged down with weapons of coral and the teeth of creatures that probably fought very hard to keep their teeth to themselves. 

The woman has gils on her throat that flutter as she breathes beneath the water. Pectoral fins jut out from her tail, from her back even, red and white, only slightly differently colored than the clearly poisonous fin rays that slate between them. Temari is a desert girl, she knows poison markings when she sees them. 

But this woman in front of her is holding her hand. Her fingers are clawed, but her eyes are brown and oddly human. She is not going to hurt her. And this might be Temari’s last chance. 

Temari uses the last breath in her body to beg. 

“Save me,” she breathes, bubbles fluttering out of her mouth and up to the surface. 

The woman tilts her head at her. Then, with little warning, stabs Temari with one of those terrible barbs. And around the agony that flares outward from the wound, Temari screams. 

There is no air left in her lungs as she screams, but she does. And fire radiates from the wound, licks through her body, filling her with the unique heat of pain. 

And then it is gone and Temari is breathing. She stares down at the barb protruding from her ribcage, then up at the creature. She grins at Temari, a grin full of sharp teeth and threat and then she darts forward and presses her mouth against Temari’s. 

The kiss draws blood, and the woman sucks it into her mouth, swiping her tongue into Temari’s as she does. 

She pulls out of the kiss, still smiling. 

“You smell like sand,” she says. “Sand and wind; poison and blood. You are strong. Deadly.”

Temari has no idea what she’s talking about. She nods slowly anyway. 

“You’re mine now,” she continues, and that makes fear and arousal (unfairly) shoot through her, radiating out of the wound in her chest. “And I protect what’s mine.”

When what is decidedly not a tail brushes against her legs, Temari looks down. And where the woman once had a magnificent tail, she now has a pair of decidedly human legs, wrapped in a sheaf of red and white striped cloth. 

“Who hurt you?” the woman asks. 

Temari is still a little dumbfounded, but the woman’s gaze is both intense and impatient. 

“Pirates,” she answers. “They attacked the vessel my brothers and I were on.” 

“Kin?” the woman asks, eyes widening. “They are in danger as well?” 

Temari nods. The woman doesn’t need her to say another word. She wraps an arm around Temari’s waist and uses her powerful legs to shove them through the water. 

They break the surface with enough force to throw them high into the air. So high, they turn in a wide arc, and below them, Temari can see the sailors and the pirates look up to see why water is dropping from the sky. 

The woman holds her, whooping as they fall through the sky. They land on the hard wood of the ship like they are landing on a pillow, and Temari chokes at the unbelievability of it all. 

“Your name?” 

The woman is already drawing a knife from her belt, the barbs on her back lifting in anticipation of attack. She puts the knife in Temari’s hands, and Temari twirls it without a second thought. It’s a dagger and the weight is odd, the coral its made of scraping her palm, but she holds it well. 

“Temari,” she answers. “Firstborn of Karura, and princess of the desertlands of Suna.”

The woman lets out a laugh like ringing bells and the promise of bloodshed. No one approaches them before it, but as soon as the sound leaves her throat, Sasori’s men snap their attention to her. 

“A princess,” she coos. “How lucky of me. I’m Tenten of the Konohagakure Ocean. You fell into my territory.”

“My apologies,” Temari replies. 

A strange tickling at her throat makes her dart a hand up to it. The gils on it are disappearing, fluttering back against her skin and melting into smooth skin. 

“Don’t bother with them,” Tenten says. “I got a wife out of it.” 

Temari has exactly zero time to wrap her mind around that before Tenten, in only that sarong and wielding a spear that was definitely smaller a couple of seconds ago, impales one of the pirates that has been dancing around her, looking lovestruck and stupid. 

She takes a half second to calibrate before she dives into the fray as well, wondering exactly how she’s going to explain to her brothers that she’s married to a mermaid.

**Author's Note:**

> dandelivns made some BEAUTIFUL art of [lionfish mermaid!tenten](https://dandelivns.tumblr.com/post/175486773044/dandelivns-tenten-as-a-lionsfish-mermaid) that is still taking my breath away this morning tbqh


End file.
